Tuesday, May 10, 2005

(SeattlePI) - She was rushing her son to school. She was eight months pregnant. And she was about to get a speeding ticket she didn't think she deserved. So when a Seattle police officer presented the ticket to Malaika Brooks, she refused to sign it.

Following her criminal trial last week on charges of refusing to obey an officer and resisting arrest, she was found guilty of the first charge, but the jury could not decide whether she resisted arrest.

Brooks was stopped in the 8300 block of Beacon Avenue South, just outside the African American Academy, while dropping her son off for school. "I said, 'Well, I'll take the ticket, but I won't sign it,' " Brooks testified.

A supervisor, Sgt. Steve Daman authorized her arrest, but they could not get Brooks out of her car because she kept a grip on her steering wheel. And that's when Jones brought out the Taser.

She told jurors the officer also used the device on her arm, and showed them a dark, brown burn to her thigh, a large, red welt on her arm and a lump on her neck, all marks she said came from the Taser application.

"As police officers, they could have hurt me seriously. They could have hurt my unborn fetus," she said. "All because of a traffic ticket. Is this what it's come down to?"

2 Comments:

People are going to have to start carrying electroshock protection if this keeps up. The idea that "police" can now start using potentially lethal weapons on us for traffic tickets is B$. The police officer who tasers a pregnant woman belongs in jail and people should make sure that "police" like that are put in jail where they belong.